


The brightest light casts the darkest shadow

by LakeGirl



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bendemption, F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, Force Bond (Star Wars), The Force
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:54:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21943939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LakeGirl/pseuds/LakeGirl
Summary: ***TROS spoilers!!!***Rey is NOT a Palpatine, and instead we pick up some of the themes from the Last Jedi that just got dropped. Selected scenes and a re-do of the final battle. Not a complete fix-it, but it at least fixes the Force.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 4
Kudos: 28





	1. KIJIMI

**Author's Note:**

> Just the scenes that are different without that horrible retcon of Rey's identity. I'm trusting that you've seen the movie and will be able to tell where all the bits go. (Let me know in the comments if not, and I'll add labels.)

He flickers into view.

"Palpatine wants you dead," his voice reverberates in the Force. No preamble. They don't do greetings.

"So you'll just keep trying to kill me, then? Got it."

"I'm not the one who wants you dead. Palpatine doesn't know all of it. This thing between us -- we're a dyad in the Force. It's the only explanation that fits...everything." Apparently, the Supreme Leader still finds time to keep up his research. She wonders if he found a Sith holocron or an ancient text. She'll scour the the Jedi texts again now that she knows what it's called.

"Together, we have far more power than Palpatine ever could." His gaze is intense. "You've felt it."

She's not about to agree with him out loud. 

"When you join me, we'll defeat Palpatine and rule together -- you've seen it too."

The connection fades before she can tell him he's wrong.

Not that he'd believe her anyway.

Not that he's wrong.

\---------------------

In the white chamber, a burnt-out shell of a helmet holds the place of honor, but it's the dagger that calls her. Rey's fingers close around it and once again she hears cries, more clearly than before. It feels like they are for her. 

The air shifts around her as Kylo appears. 

His eyes flick to the dagger in her hand. " _There_ you are," his words come through the Force. Great, they'll need to get off this Destroyer fast once this session is over. She ignites Luke's saber.

"Those cries you hear -- that dagger killed your parents."

"You're lying!" she spits out without thinking, swiping out with the saber as he ignites his.

He dodges and circles, watching her intensely. "You know I'm not. I've never lied to you. I don't think I even can, with this." He gestures at whatever is between them.

"I felt you sometimes, years ago, just before my parents sent me away. Palpatine must have as well, or maybe Snoke did. Your parents never even knew why they were being hunted."

The anguished voices crest again in her mind. The woman sounds like her mother. She's not going to shed tears in front of him, though, not again. So she lunges to strike. He blocks and keeps talking. 

"They traded you away like junk, but still, they died without saying where you were. And you -- " he circles a few steps more. "You must have cut yourself off from the Force somehow, because no one ever found a trace."

She catches a fragment of a memory from him, the jolt of awareness when he learned the droid he sought was with a girl -- _"What girl?"_

Another circle. "This is why you'll turn and stand by my side." 

"We've been over this, Ben. I saw something different." In spite of his confident tone, she wonders if he keeps repeating it to convince her that it's true, or himself.

They trade blows for real then, until the helmet smashes. Kylo looks stricken and she thinks she hears a voice say, _"Ben..."_

She sprints for the Falcon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Rey's conversation with Luke.


	2. ACH-TO

She leaves the ruined Death Star without looking back. Kylo is weak, but no longer mortally injured, so he's not her responsibility. She takes his ship without thinking twice, and runs. From him. From Finn and Poe, who are probably looking for her. And from Leia, because somehow, she was there, too. 

\--------------------

She's already at light speed when she notices the green glowing pyramid with her in the cockpit. She sighs. She hadn't even meant to steal the Wayfinder. 

\--------------------

On Ach-to, she watches the flames and gives in to exhaustion. It's over. She's tired all the way through. Of trying to be Light enough. Of not knowing how. Of fighting him when she's not sure if she's still supposed to.

After this last battle, something _has_ to change. You can't impale someone with his own lightsaber, heal him and then go back to trying to kill him. She hurls Luke's lightsaber into the burning hulk.

"A Jedi weapon deserves more respect." Luke strolls out of the inferno, glowing blue, with the saber and a hint of a smile.

"You said the Jedi Order needs to end. So I'm ending it. Right here. I'm going to live out my days cut off from the Force, just like you."

"You _know_ that didn't go the way I thought it would." Luke sighed. "Rey, I was wrong. Hiding here didn't help anything in the end."

"I've seen the future -- and I refuse to turn to the Dark side and rule the galaxy at Kylo's side. But if we're really a dyad, then I can't get away from him and it might happen whether I want it or not." The words tumble out almost as a sob. "So, yeah. I'm staying here."

"Force visions are the worst." He sits next to her and he looks tired, too. Rey wonders what visions the Force plagued _him_ with over the years.

"The future is always in motion, Rey. My master told me that things we see are just possibilities, not certainties. And sometimes, they're accurate but don't mean what they seem to."

"So are you saying I should just go ahead and become his Empress, and maybe it won't actually be a disaster for the galaxy?"

He rolls his eyes. "I definitely didn't say that."

Luke gazes at the burning wreck. "The Jedi were wrong about a lot of things, Rey. They were too rigid and couldn't handle the idea that pure Light isn't the only thing the galaxy needs. They warped the Force, just as much as the Sith did."

Luke turns to her. "But they were right about this -- we have to face our fears. That's what takes away their power. That vision haunts you because it expresses something that you're deeply afraid of. It won't go away until you confront it."

"I don't know what it means to confront it."

"Well, that's all I've got for you. And honestly, it's a lot more than you should expect from a crotchety old Force ghost like me." His eyes are gentle and take away some of the sting of his words.

"Rey, a thousand generations of Jedi live in you now. But this is your fight, and you can learn from our mistakes."

He offers her the lightsaber.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Everyone makes their way to Exegol.


	3. EXEGOL, Part 1

"Ah, the hate. The _anger_!" Palpatine's face twists into something like a smile. "The power you feel in this place -- it's the power of a thousand generations of Sith lords. It can all be yours, take it! Strike me down, Rey. Use your anger!"

Rey breathes, and looks at the hopelessly overwhelmed Resistance ships above. She senses Ben drawing nearer. Ben, not Kylo Ren.

Palpatine notices his approach, too. "You defeated Kylo Ren," he snarls, "and he's just a shadow of what he could have been. There is no one to stand in your way. Strike me down, Rey, and fulfill your destiny."

\----------------------------

As he runs, he feels lighter. Strong and full of purpose. Free from conflict. And not alone.

The Knights of Ren block his way. He only has a blaster, but he can make this work. He thinks of his dad, and the tale of him charging an entire brigade of Stormtroopers with just a blaster. Ben doesn't have Chewie at his side, but does he have the Force.

And what the Force does is connect him to Rey. Who is about to strike down Palpatine.

They don't speak, but Rey leaves herself open, questioning. Not asking for help, exactly, but seeking his intention. She thinks she's trapped and had almost decided Darkness might be the only way out. 

She meets his eyes and gives a tiny nod. For the first time, they try something together.

He feels metal in his hand, warm from her grip. In that moment, he believes that together, they really can do anything.

He raises his grandfather's blade, his uncle's blade. The crystal throbs in welcome. The knights never have a chance.

\--------------------------

"No. I won't strike you down in anger," she turns from Palpatine.

"Oh, but you will." He sneers and the lightning crackles around Rey. She writhes and shrieks and catches a memory of a young Luke screaming on the floor of the Death Star before it sank into the ocean. Palpatine leaves her spent on the floor, just as he had Luke, and turns his attention to the battle above.

_"Be with me,"_ she chants silently.

\--------------------------

Ben slices through the last guards and enters the chamber.

"Kylo Ren, the last Skywalker," Palpatine taunts. "You were defeated in battle and your mind is weak. You are a disappointment. A nobody is going to take all that could have been yours." And he blasts Ben aside.

Lying dazed on the cold stone, he feels Rey chanting, and understands what she is doing. Linking his mind with hers is as easy as breathing.

And they are not alone. The gathering Jedi speak Rey's name and welcome her. He feels Luke, and somehow knows Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi, too.

As the Jedi accept his presence, he senses Rey changing her plan. "A thousand generations of Jedi live in you, too, Ben," she whispers in his mind. He wants to tell her she's wrong, but then the voices speak to him, too.

_"Ben, I won't fail you this time."_

_"I am proud to share a name with you, Ben."_

_"While you followed the darkest part of my path, I couldn't reach you. But Ben, I'm with you now."_

_"Hmm, yes. With you we_ all _are, young Skywalker."_

He feels Rey's intention, feels her gathering her anger. She disengages her mind and stalks toward Palpatine, whose face lights up with glee.

\------------------------

Rey gathers her anger and hatred like the weapons they are. She approaches Palpatine with Leia's blade, bent on revenge for all the pain he caused. He revels in the anger cascading off her. That's all she lets him feel, lets herself feel. She lets out a battle cry and strikes him down.

When the Sith enter her, it's not with gentle fellowship of the Jedi -- it's with roiling ambition, anger, fear and POWER. So much power. And to maintain their power, they must protect their fleet.

She raises her hand and lets the lightning out. Resistance ships begin to fall from the sky.

At the other side of the chamber, someone else rises and raises a hand. He projects a shield between her lightning and the ships. She roars and pours more Force into the lightning, feeding on the ambition and anger of all those inside.

But the shield strengthens, too.

\--------------------------

With the might of the entire Jedi Order coursing through him, Ben realizes with dread that they still won't win. They can't.

Darkness has risen and the Light to meet it -- but not to defeat it. He can shield the ships, but he can't overpower the Sith. They are evenly matched, and the cycle of a thousand generations has no end.

There has to be something else. He feels his Uncle Luke smile and say, _"Han would ask you about the girl. He did come to believe in the rebellion, you know, but he never could separate it from how he felt about your mother."_

Rey's eyes are glowing yellow and her face is twisted with hate. 

She walked into the Dark trusting him, the other half of her dyad, to stay anchored in the Light. And he thinks she meant it when she said she wanted to his hand, Ben's hand.

So again, he reaches out to her. 


	4. EXEGOL part 2

She feels a shift in the Force and looks across the chamber.

Ben Solo stands proud and straight with a hand raised to the skies, radiating Light like an ancient god. And his other hand is extended to her.

The Sith see weakness and deride the naiveté of the Light. She feels Palpatine's cackle through her body and she thinks it even escapes her mouth. What can this _boy_ possibly offer her compared to all this power?

The very small part of her that is still Rey sees something else. She sees someone who has walked in Darkness, who carried so much of it inside him he thought he could never go back to the Light. But here he is, glowing with the Light of a thousand generations of Jedi. And she can't look away, because he is reaching out to her.

Ben Solo is reaching out to her.

And as she stands in Darkness, with the power of a thousand generations of Sith coursing through her, that small part of her that is still Rey remembers _why_ she walked into Darkness. And she tries to reach back. 

The Sith pull at her, tell her that he is weak. She defeated him, and she can rule the galaxy without him. Her arm is stone, a mountain that won't move. She looks at him, and sees that he's still there, his hand still out. He'll looks like he could stand there for days if that's what it takes.

She bares her teeth and yells and _pulls_ and

\-------------------------

Rey is still.

Maintaining the shield, keeping hand out to Rey -- it takes more than he has. But the Jedi are with him. He's not alone, and he knows now he never really was.

He knows what he has to do, and he knows he has the strength to do it. His parents believed in him and held their hearts open for him, no matter how long it took. He can do that for Rey.

When he finally sees her arm twitch, he knows the battle has barely begun. The blue lightning crackles around her as the struggle shifts inward. The Sith fight her for every millimeter.

Ben stretches his hand further and sends belonging and belief through their connection. He doesn't know if she can sense it, but maybe she can see it on his face. Her movement is agonizingly halting. He takes a cautious step toward her.

An eon later, Rey's arm is fully outstretched toward him, and apparently the Force or their dyad-ness or whatever has it from here. Ben feels her fingers against his own, and then he feels everything else in the world.

Exhilaration. Fury. Forgiveness. Joy. Anguish. Love. Heartache. Laughter. Doubt. Resolve. Frustration. Peace.

All the emotions pour through him and out of him, his own and the memories from the legion of Jedi within. They meet a matching tsunami crashing through Rey, and in the space between them gathers an impossible concentration of the full range of human emotion.

It swirls and writhes and compresses and then finally pulses out in a cataclysmic wave that knocks everything flat and silent.

\--------------------------

When Ben comes to, the battlefield above is oddly still and his heart sinks -- did they just kill _everyone_? That must have been the Starkiller equivalent of what his father would have called "Force mumb-jumbo."

He closes his eyes and reaches out in the Force and feels life, knocked just out like he was. They can figure that part out later.

He turns to Rey.

\-------------------------

Poe slowly recognizes the cockpit of his X-Wing. The radio crackles and someone asks, "What _was_ that?"

"Some Force thing?" he says, in the most General-like way he can muster. He shakes his head again. "Rey's doing her job, let's do ours. Take out those cannons!"

But something doesn't feel entirely right. He adds, "But that Force thing -- let's not mess with it. Fire on the enemy ONLY in self-defense. This is just about those cannons unless they show us it's not."

\-------------------------

Ben lays Rey out in his arms, steadies his breath and drops into meditation. The Force feels different. It's richer than it has ever felt before, more complex, more alive. _Did we do that?_ he asks, with wonder. _Is this what true balance feels like?_

He channels everything he can into Rey.

Their minds connect before he feels her body stir, and relief floods both ways. He shares a bit of his panic at finding her lifeless form and overwhelming pride at what she did. She gives reassurance and pride right back.

 _"I was right, Scavenger, you_ did _turn."_ He sends this with a surge of affection, not that he thinks she could misunderstand him with their minds linked like this.

 _"So did you, Ben Solo, just like in my vision."_ Along with the warmth, he catches a glimpse of how Rey had seen him as he channeled the Light. He feels a deep longing -- if only his parents could have seem him as she had. _"They did, Ben, they did,"_ she answers, thick with emotion.

_"And we burned it all down -- the Sith, the Jedi, all of it."_

_"I don't think we exactly destroyed it, but yes, we moved past the Jedi and the Sith."_ She pauses and just feels for a moment, exploring the newly reknit fabric of the Force. _"The Light and Dark aren't opposing each other anymore. They're working together, they're creating -- balance."_

 _"You took my hand."_ A large part of him still can't believe that part is true, that she fought the will of the entire Sith legacy to take his hand. He clutches her closer and her body finally stirs. Her hand lurches up to cover his.

 _"Of course, Ben, I told you I wanted to."_ She says this as though it were such a simple truth, and he's staggered all over again.

He opens his eyes to look into hers. They're green. And she's smiling at him.

\-------------------------

Rey is lost in their kiss and in his grin, which she guesses is his first in years. She doesn't realize anything is wrong until he slumps in her arms.

_"Ben!"_

She healed this man not long ago. But she doesn't have enough this time, enough time, enough energy...

She feels Leia's presence flit through them, as Ben fades into the Force.


	5. AFTERWARD

She hangs on tight to Finn and Poe. She can tell Finn is crying, too, though she guesses Poe isn't. They love her and they aren't going to evaporate into the Force if she blinks.

In the quiet much later that night, Finn comes to sit with her.

"What happened down there?"

After a long pause, she answers, "I don't have the words to describe it."

"I'll listen whenever you're ready." After a pause, "But Palpatine -- he's really gone, right?"

"Yes, Palpatine is really gone."

She can't say out loud who else is gone.

\--------------------------

Poe, of course, is more direct.

"Rey, you gotta tell us what happened down there. Whatever it was, it knocked two entire navies out cold. " He shook his head. "It's a story for the ages, and it needs to be told."

"Oh! Perhaps _I_ can help!" interjects C-3PO. "My programming includes storytelling traditions in more than two millions cultures across the -- "

"Not now Threepio!" Poe swats at the droid.

But not before Rey slips away.

\-------------------------

It's Chewie who she tells first. His growls and wails are the only responses she wants to hear. His feelings about Ben are as complicated as her own, and his grief is just as heavy.

Even his bone-crushing hug doesn't crack through the pain, though she can pretend it does for a little while.

\------------------------

She claims the name Skywalker, but something about that doesn't feel entirely right. If things had gone differently, she thinks she would have been a Solo.

\------------------------

She finally tells Finn the whole story. Hesitantly, because he never knew Ben like Chewie did.

Finn mostly listens silently. He snorts, though, when she describes setting Kylo's Tie Silencer on fire. "You really hate those things, don't you?"

She doesn't know where it comes from, the giggle that sneaks out.

At the end, Finn doesn't speak for a long time. He finally asks, "When you said you had a, a vision of you and...him, on that throne, though. That part didn't happen?"

"It didn't." She almost wished the vision still haunted her. "Luke said the future is always in motion. I suppose that future wasn't possible any more, once he chose to be Ben Solo again."

"So you didn't become an evil empress like you were afraid of. Instead you teamed up to restore balance to the Force and save the galaxy?"

"Yeah," she says with a sad smile, "I guess you could say that."

Finn beams at her proudly, and she finally feels a crack in her grief.

\-------------------------

She doesn't see any full-fledged Force ghosts again, but she can tell they're not really gone.

She feels hints, flowing together and through her with other currents of the Force. Sometimes, when she needs comfort, she feels a motherly embrace and soft hair against her cheek. Sometimes, when she feels doubt, she can sense piercing blue eyes that know how to live with failure.

And her favorite moments are when she allows herself to experience joy. She feels a strong hand on hers and the warmth of a galaxy-bright smile, and she feels complete.

**Author's Note:**

> Completely written, will edit and post the remaining chapters over the next few days, so subscribe for updates! 
> 
> I would love your comments! This is my first work in the fandom and there's so much to talk about. :)


End file.
